About Gaia Engineering

Gaia Engineering is the name we use to describe the development by TecEco and others of a tececology that substantially rectifies problems on the planet. Gaia Engineering is not is not a single process or paradigm. It embraces
a number of new technical paradigms and processes designed to when combined solve global warming
and waste problems by substantial reversal of moleconomic flows. The Gaia Engineering tececology will work because
combined correctly these new technologies and processes will make money. On a large scale the Gaia Engineering project will sequester significant
amounts of atmospheric CO2 and convert a substantial amount of waste into building materials. Significantly there are no legacies for future generations..

TecEco and others have formed the The Global Sustainability Alliance to raise awareness and finance for Gaia Engineering and below follows a short description of what Gaia Engineering is all about. On the main menu you will find a link to a new web site with much more detail about Gaia Engineering.

Graphic Illustration of the Gaia Engineering Process for Seawater

As there is 1.29 grams of magnesium in every litre of seawater and brines generally contain even more there is enough magnesiaum to last over a billion years at current needs for sequestration. With natural replenishment the resource will last indefinitely.

The inital process for carbon capture in Gaia Engineering will probably be chosen from one of the following technologies

Gaia Engineering Front End Processes

Process:

Inputs:

Outputs:

Links:

Greensols

Seawater or
brines, waste acid and CO2

Mineral salts, carbonate building materials and aggregates, Eco-Cements and fresh water

Mangesium oxide and chlorine gas (or hydrochloric acid). This process could be combined with the greensols process to supply acid.

Ultra Centrifuges

Seawater or brine

Provided materials can be found to withstand the forces involved, potentially similar by products to the Greensols process.

Biomimetic

Carbonic anhydrase, saltwater or brines and CO2

Using carbonic anhydrase and other enzymes to mimic carbonate formation in nature. Catalysts like carbonic anhydrase could also feasibly be used with our cements to speed up the carbonation process.

Most of the carbonate produced is will be cut into blocks or crushed to make aggregates Some will be used in an evolving number of sub-processes including:

TecEco’s Tec-Kiln, for low-temperature, non fossil fuel calcination of magnesium carbonate without releases - converting it to magnesium oxide for use in TecEco Tec, Eco and Enviro-Cements

A Hydroxide Carbon Capture Cycle for additional CO2 capture

The TecEco Tec-Kiln will calcine magnesium carbonate without releaseas, capturing the gas for incorporation into cellulose, fuel or other useful compounds including the main component of TecEco Tec, Eco and Enviro-Cements and input for the Tec-Reactor hydroxide/carbonate carbon capture cycle. Eco-Cement concretes absorb more atmospheric CO2 as they harden and will be used to bind together aggregates and other building components produced by the front end processes. All TecEco cements can utilise waste.

The carbonates produced by the Tec-Reactor hydroxide/carbonate Carbon Capture cycle are also recycled around it with some bleed off into the MgCO2 cycle shown by the green arrow in the above diagram and in black arrows below.

Gaia Engineering Flow Diagram

The MgCO2 cycle (or to the technically minded, the Magnesium thermodynamic
cycle) incorporates the Tec-Reactor hydroxide/carbonate Carbon Capture cycle and mimics photosynthesis using the same central atom (magnesium). It can
go around and around like a bicycle wheel as together, mass and energy are neither
created nor destroyed, only lost outside the system through inefficiencies.
There is an exothermic part of the cycle where heat is required and an endothermic
part where heat is released. To make the process as efficient as possible it
is desirable to capture the heat from the exothermic parts and
transfer it to the endothermic parts of the cycle to some extent depending on flows.

All CO2 captured ends up permanently sequestered as man made carbonate building materials thereby mimicking natural processes. Solving the global warming crisis is that easy.